The zero-sum trap inside the movement to keep trans kids out of sports | Opinion
High school athletics are many things, but there’s one thing competing in any sport involves: winners and losers. And at the end of a sport’s season, district and state championships sort athletes and teams into relative categories of good, better and best.
This feature is so strong that it can be easy to start to see the whole world that way. If you win, I lose.
That’s the mentality I perceive hidden in a comment from Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights Kimberly Richey as her office in the U.S. Department of Education announced an investigation into policies for trans athletes at Tacoma Public Schools, three other school districts in Washington, and more than a dozen other educational entities in the United States.
“Violations of women’s rights, dignity, and fairness are unacceptable,” she said.
Well, yeah. I’m a former high school athlete in girls cross-country and track. I once wrapped up a long-distance race at a meet in Tacoma, sat down on the field near the track’s 300-meter mark, and started reading chapters from feminist classic “The Feminine Mystique.” So in the abstract, I agree with Richey’s statement.
What I don’t agree with is waving the banner for women’s and girls’ rights in order to shut down conversation about someone else’s rights. And I don’t agree that it’s a violation of those rights to consider — in a careful, nuanced way — how to include trans students in athletic programs.
Most fundamentally, I don’t agree that if trans athletes win access to sports, girls and women automatically lose.
And yet, we’re constantly told that the federal government’s crusade against trans participation in sports (or daily life) is for the defense of girls and women.
Not just to defend girls from losing to an athlete who was born male. But to protect their safety, as if trans athletes are uniquely able to injure females in activities where everyone is intentionally pushing their own bodies to the limit.
The risk any given athlete poses to another is always going to be variable, and is already a serious consideration in how athletics programs are run. I think the system can handle it. And if we’re talking about the perceived danger of simply being around people who were born male, then we’re talking about behavior that’s already banned for anyone of any sex.
I get that there’s money at stake. Other than bragging rights, athletes can win a part of the multi-billion dollar pot of college scholarship money available each year. But NCAA policy currently restricts competition in women’s sports to athletes assigned female at birth who are not taking testosterone therapy.
So what are we talking about here?
My best guess is that some feel any participation by trans athletes in girls’ sports makes having distinct teams pointless. But the current policy from the Washington Interscholastic Activities Association already allows trans participation, and the teams continue on.
I think what we’re really talking about is the potential for a girls’ soccer team with a trans player to win over one without, or a trans tennis player to out-match an opponent in girls’ singles. I know the bitter disappointment of losing and what it feels like to wonder if things weren’t fair. I don’t want to dismiss that potential experience.
I don’t have the answer for that situation. I will say that sports are full of relative advantage. People grumble when a well-funded private school wins against a public one, but there’s no massive push to get preps out of sports leagues. Other teams luck into being the home school of a phenom or a parent with deep pockets.
Most importantly, we can’t talk about this simplistically in terms of one athlete taking something from another. The right conversation looks at both athletes as genuine people looking to compete in good faith, and to experience sports for all they’re worth.
That includes seeing who wins, but also seeing how far you can go. It’s working as a team, building skills and learning to face the outcome.
This story was originally published January 16, 2026 at 2:03 PM.
